Government Proposals

Below is an abstract
of the items from the Coalition Government's proposals that particularly relate to education and teachers,

From the Preface: “We both want a Britain where social
mobility is unlocked; where everyone, regardless of background, has the chance
to rise as high as their talents and ambition allow them. To pave the way, we
have both agreed to sweeping reform of welfare, taxes and, most of all, our
schools – with a breaking open of the state monopoly and extra money following
the poorest pupils so that they, at last, get to go to the best schools, not
the worst.”

SCHOOLS

The Government believes that we need to reform our school system
to tackle educational inequality, which has widened in recent years, and to
give greater powers to parents and pupils to choose a good school. We want to
ensure high standards of discipline in the classroom, robust standards and the
highest quality teaching. We also believe that the state should help parents,
community groups and others come together to improve the education system by
starting new schools.

•We
will promote the reform of schools in order to ensure that new providers can
enter the state school system in response to parental demand; that all schools
have greater freedom over the curriculum; and that all schools are held
properly to account.

•We
will fund a significant premium for disadvantaged pupils from outside the
schools budget by reductions in spending elsewhere.

•We
will give parents, teachers, charities and local communities the chance to set
up new schools, as part of our plans to allow new providers to enter the state
school system in response to parental demand.

•We
will support Teach First, create Teach Now to build on the Graduate Teacher
Programme, and seek other ways to improve the quality of the teaching
profession.

•We
will reform the existing rigid national pay and conditions rules to give
schools greater freedoms to pay good teachers more and deal with poor
performance.

•We
will simplify the regulation of standards in education and target inspection on
areas of failure.

•We
will give anonymity to teachers accused by pupils and take other measures to
protect against false accusations.

•We
will seek to attract more top science and maths graduates to be teachers.

•We
will publish performance data on educational providers, as well as past exam
papers.

•We
will create more flexibility in the exams systems so that state schools can
offer qualifications like the IGCSE.

•We
will reform league tables so that schools are able to focus on, and
demonstrate, the progress of children of all abilities.

•We
will give heads and teachers the powers they need to ensure discipline in the
classroom and promote good behaviour.

•We believe
the most vulnerable children deserve the very highest quality of care. We will
improve diagnostic assessment for schoolchildren, prevent the unnecessary
closure of special schools, and remove the bias towards inclusion.

•We
will improve the quality of vocational education, including increasing
flexibility for 14–19 year olds and creating new Technical Academies as part of
our plans to diversify schools provision.

•We
will keep external assessment, but will review how Key Stage 2 tests operate in
future.

•We
will ensure that all new Academies follow an inclusive admissions policy. We
will work with faith groups to enable more faith schools and facilitate
inclusive admissions policies in as many of these schools as possible.

PENSIONS

•We
will commit to establishing an independent commission to review the long­term
affordability of public sector pensions, while protecting accrued rights.

FAMILIES AND
CHILDREN

•We
support the provision of free nursery care for pre-school children, and we want
that support to be provided by a diverse range of providers, with a greater
gender balance in the early years workforce.

•We
will take Sure Start back to its original purpose of early intervention,
increase its focus on the neediest families, and better involve organisations
with a track record of supporting families. We will investigate ways of
ensuring that providers are paid in part by the results they achieve.

•We
will review the criminal records and vetting and barring regime and scale it
back to common sense levels.

DEFICIT REDUCTION

•We
will significantly accelerate the reduction of the structural deficit over the
course of a Parliament, with the main burden of deficit reduction borne by
reduced spending rather than increased taxes.

•We
will introduce arrangements that will protect those on low incomes from the
effect of public sector pay constraint and other spending constraints.

•We
will set out a plan for deficit reduction in an emergency budget. We have
created an independent Office for Budget Responsibility to make new forecasts
of growth and borrowing for this emergency budget.

•We
will make modest cuts of £6 billion to non-front-line services within the
financial year 2010/11, subject to advice from the Treasury and the Bank of
England on their feasibility and advisability. A proportion of these savings
can be used to support jobs.

•We
will hold a full Spending Review reporting this autumn, following a fully
consultative process involving all tiers of government and the private sector.

•We
will reduce spending on the Child Trust Fund and tax credits for higher
earners.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

•We
will promote the radical devolution of power and greater financial autonomy to
local government and community groups. This will include a review of local
government finance.

•We
will freeze Council Tax in England
for at least one year, and seek to freeze it for a further year, in partnership
with local authorities.

•We
will create directly elected mayors in the 12 largest English cities, subject
to confirmatory referendums and full scrutiny by elected councillors.

•We
will allow councils to return to the committee system, should they wish to.

EQUALITIES

•We
will undertake a fair pay review in the public sector to implement our proposed
‘20 times’ pay multiple.

POLITICAL REFORM

•We
will give residents the power to instigate local referendums on any local
issue.

•We
will give residents the power to veto excessive council tax increases.

SOCIAL ACTION

•We
will support the creation and expansion of mutuals, co-operatives, charities
and social enterprises, and enable these groups to have much greater
involvement in the running of public services.

•We
will give public sector workers a new right to form employee-owned
co-operatives and bid to take over the services they deliver. This will empower
millions of public sector workers to become their own boss and help them to
deliver better services.

UNIVERSITIES AND FURTHER EDUCATION

The Government believes that our universities are essential for
building a strong and innovative economy. We will take action to create more
college and university places, as well as help to foster stronger links between
universities, colleges and industries.

•We
will seek ways to support the creation of apprenticeships, internships, work
pairings, and college and workplace training places as part of our wider
programme to get Britain
working.

•We
will set colleges free from direct state control and abolish many of the
further education quangos. Public funding should be fair and follow the choices
of students.

•We
will await Lord Browne’s final report into higher education funding, and will
judge its proposals against the need to:

– increase social
mobility;

– take into account
the impact on student debt;

– ensure a properly
funded university sector;

– improve the
quality of teaching;

– advance
scholarship; and

-attract a higher
proportion of students from disadvantaged backgrounds.

•If the
response of the Government to Lord Browne’s report is one that Liberal
Democrats cannot accept, then arrangements will be made to enable Liberal
Democrat MPs to abstain in any vote.

•We
will review support for part-time students in terms of loans and fees.

•We
will publish more information about the costs, graduate earnings and student
satisfaction of different university courses.

•We
will ensure that public funding mechanisms for university research safeguard
its academic integrity.